


hide the bullet from the gun

by decideophobia



Category: The Magicians (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fix-It of Sorts, Friendship, Gen, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Mental Instability, Relationship Negotiation, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-12
Updated: 2019-05-12
Packaged: 2020-03-02 08:07:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,415
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18807124
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/decideophobia/pseuds/decideophobia
Summary: A reimagining of the bonfire scene. Quentin sings. And then some.





	hide the bullet from the gun

**Author's Note:**

> First of all, [this is the song](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0vIRIqO-2E) that inspired the idea for this fic. It's such a Quentin song, it hit me like a fucking freight train, and I wondered how the bonfire scene might look like from a different angle. This started as a fic to celebrate friendship, but then because I can't leave my boys high and dry it ended with gratituous Queliot at the end. 
> 
> I excluded Kady, Penny-23 and Fogg from this because, at the end of the day, Quentin isn't actually close to them, and I couldn't picture them in this. 
> 
> This is also horribly unbeta'd. I basically barfed this up and put it here, so apologies for all mistakes. It's all very self-indulgent, and I think this might be the fourth Queliot reunion I've written, and it's basically all the same. Sorry about that.

_**despondent, catatonic suicide queen** _

* * *

He’s always excelled at minor mendings. The spell is easy, so easy, like breathing, and it comes naturally to him, just like the all-devouring blackness inside his own head. And here, in this dead black world, in front of the mirror that holds the Seam, holds the end and beginning of all things, here the blackness settles heavily at the front of his head; it envelopes him so entirely like a blanket, cooing at him with bared, long, sharp teeth. It beckons him, an enigmatic pull that holds a terrifyingly soothing appeal; so sweet, so promising, so welcoming.

The magic slips easily through Quentin’s fingers but it feels different in this eerie place. It’s stripped naked, slides against his skin in waves of pins and needles, raw and acidic; magic that’s come from pain: pure, ripped from inside the warmth behind his ribs, bleeding, _sacrificial_. 

The sparks glow in this dark, dead place; illuminating it so marvelously that he could stare at it forever. Blackness smirks and snaps its teeth, lit up so nicely by the lights bouncing around. It grows and grows and grows, gaping up into a all-encompassing abyss as it curls at his feet, alluring, so sweetly, as it swallows the sparks.

Quentin can feel something settle in his mind. It’s heavy: a weight that drops all the way through his entire body, spreading like vines into the tips of his fingers, his toes, the most hidden parts of himself. 

In this dark, dead place it’s easy to look the blackness in his mind in the eye and let go of all the things that have weighed him down.

* * *

_**couldn't help me, you held me, the shadows began to fade** _

* * *

Quentin stands in front of the bonfire. The heat of the flames is almost too much against the skin of his face but it’s grounding. Alice and Julia are sitting behind him, a little dubious, probably, because he dragged them out here without any explanation. He’s talked to Margo and asked her to come too, bring Eliot, if he could be stitched up enough to get out of bed. Quentin has been unable to make himself face Eliot yet; the emotions running too high, too scared, too relieved, too full of too much, and Quentin has a hard time breathing through all of it. The same breathless part vibrates with the need to see him, hissing and spitting angrily at him from deep within, but powerless to move Quentin into Eliot’s direction.

“Q,” Julia probes quietly from behind him, and Quentin releases a tense breath. 

There’s something deeply theatralic about the whole sentiment when he goes through the music tut. The magic comes easy now, flows over his skin and skitters through his fingers; flashing hot and intense, too much of it in the air. It settles comfortable in his palms, though, nestling gently and willingly, as the first piano tunes start playing.

Quentin shakes out his hands, the words rolling off his tongue easy and familiar as he starts singing. He wouldn’t even need the spell to know them. A little incredulous bubbles up from deep inside of him, and he turns to look at Julia and Alice who both look dubious and concerned while Quentin sings the first verse of the song.

Margo comes out onto the little clearing with Eliot at her side, leaning into her, one hand wrapped around a familiar looking cane. Quentin almost stumbles over the words as his heart trips and stutters, doing excited and terrified somersaults in his chest. Eliot looks better than when they had dragged him to Lipson. It surprises Quentin a little at how _unsurprised_ he is to see nothing but _Eliot_ now, no trace of the Monster, despite the fact that—

Eliot meets his gaze, the light of the flames dancing enticingly in his eyes, and he takes Quentin’s breath away. He’s impeccably dressed again, although most of it is covered by a black coat, shaven jaw and hair smoothed back. The sickly look is mostly gone from his face, though exhaustion is etched around his eyes, a sad set to his mouth. His brows furrow as he watches Quentin, takes in the music and the song while Margo helps him settle down before she squeezes in between him and Alice. 

Quentin looks at each of them, lets his eyes linger on their faces, so precious and dear to him: the faces of the people without whom he wouldn’t be here, who are just as much a part of him as the blackness in his mind. He feels his hands shake with everything he feels for them, so much it spills over and out; hears his voice tremble with the overwhelming affection and gratitude that sweeps through him.

His friends share a look between them but some of the concern has melted away.

Quentin turns back to the fire. He’s burned something before any of them arrived, and now he looks into the crate at the pitiful remains of his favourite books. Something tugs at his heart but it’s achingly sweet and nostalgic, a memory of a different time mingled with the despairing disappointment of what had come of it. It hurts, unexpectedly fiercely, but it’s a pain that doesn’t feel like it’ll leave scars. Mending pain, moving-on pain, healing pain. Pain that fuels something different. 

Pain that fuels his hope. Fuels his fight. Fuels his love.

He takes a deep breath, pulls up the words from his mind and whispers them as his hands dance over the fire. It crackles once, colouring the fire purple-yellow for a moment before it goes back to white-yellow-red. The soft tunes of the piano keep playing, and Quentin resumes singing to it.

His heart thrums behind his ribs, an uneven staccato of nerves, devotion, and sheer overwhelming certainty that these are his _people_. 

Quentin reaches into the flames and hears one collective shocked gasp coming out of four mouths. The flames lick at his skin, gently, like a caress, playfully dancing along his arm as he pulls something from the ashes of what used to be his only solace in the world.

The weight of it settles in his palm, cool and smooth, and it’s odd, the feeling that comes with it. 

Quentin turns, eyes finding Margo’s. Her gaze slips over the empty green champagne bottle he cradles between his hands and then meets his.

“Quentin,” she says, softly, a question in the way she looks at him. He smiles as he comes to stand in front of her. Margo gets to her feet, eyes sliding back down at the bottle. 

* * *

_here's to the ones, the renegades who never run_

* * *

“We’ll get him back,” Margo says, cupping his face between both her palms, and makes him look at her. “We will get him back.”

Quentin wants to look away. He cannot bear the hope and determination in her eyes; cannot stand looking at them when all that’s left inside himself is…nothing. Margo doesn’t let go of him, though. Her eyes search his face, expression slipping from hopeful excitement to deep-settling worry.

“Quentin,” she whispers and bites her bottom lip to try and hide it trembling. Her impeccable facade slips away, her sharp edges and the polished armor fade as they give way to all her soft spots, opening her up to the razors and thorns that stick out of Quentin. “It’s not too late.”

Isn’t it?

“I know it’s been a lot for you,” Margo says softly, voice pitched deep and close to breaking. “I know how hard you’ve been fighting. I know you gave it your all.”

“It wasn’t enough,” Quentin points out, the sharp teeth of the blackness in his mind snapping at his heels, vicious and delighted. _It wasn’t enough. You weren’t enough._

Quentin half expects a litany of curses out of Margo’s mouth, calling him out and telling him pussy up. Instead, she offers, “You _are_ enough. You kept everyone going this far. You kept _Eliot_ alive.”

Her voice is softer now, urgent, tinged with pride and gratitude and awe, as she plucks the razors and thorns one by one from Quentin’s skin. Margo’s eyes scan his face. Gingerly, she strokes her thumbs over his cheeks, offering a comfort not unfamiliar to how Eliot used to give it away, but still in a manner that is so _Margo_ it leaves Quentin’s heart stuttering. 

“You are enough, Quentin.” Her words are imbued with conviction so heavy the weight of settles tangibly between them, soaking into Quentin’s skin and spreading, with every stumbling heartbeat, through the rest of his body, making it easier to breathe with every intake of air. “This isn’t a one person quest. This isn’t only on you. You don’t need to carry this weight alone.”

She fixes him with a look before pulling him into a _tighttightight_ hug. Margo squeezes him, telling his broken pieces to mend, or else. Margo the Destroyer, who is willing to obliterate anything and anyone who dares to cross her or the people she loves, holds him against the soft, vulnerable core of herself, full of so much affection and concern that it’s enough to reignite the little flame of fight inside Quentin. Margo who cups the base of his skull, holding him tight, and who manages to see through him with such ease it terrifies him a little, sometimes. Margo who rarely lets anyone see who she truly is, how deeply she feels, how entirely she devotes herself to the people she loves, cradles him like a precious thing and holds him until the pain lessens a little, until the blackness around the edges of his mind growls in a momentary defeat and retreats enough for Quentin to _breathe_ again. 

“I miss him,” Quentin confesses into her hair, so quietly he’s unsure she heard him. 

Margo’s finger at the nape of his neck squeeze gently in response. “I know, baby.”

They stay like that for a moment longer. As they pull apart, Margo grabs his hands. “We will get him back. I’m here now. I got you.”

Quentin believes her. 

* * *

_**by now I know a screw's loose or too few** _

* * *

He clears his throat and Margo looks up at him. 

“Thank you for not letting me carry the weight alone,” Quentin says around the lump in his throat, offering her a small, grateful smile. He holds out the bottle, feeling silly but hoping she’ll understand, and thinks back to when she fucking roofied him during the Trials. And okay, it’s not exactly that memory he’s holding onto, but the moment of genuine companionship that came before. It was one of the first times Margo had revealed herself to him: the soft, vulnerable tissue beneath all the diamond-hard, polished facade. Back then, she had taken a little bit of weight off him, too.

Margo gazes at him with achingly soft eyes for a moment. Her hands settle on his, holding onto the bottle with him, and there’s understanding shining through on her features. Understanding, but something gentler, too, and Quentin blinks against the tears collecting in his eyes. 

“Always,” Margo promises as she takes the bottle from his hands, reaching up to cup his cheek with one hand and press a soft, lingering kiss to the other. She smiles, happy and teary-eyed, too, at him. “What the fuck am I supposed to do with an empty fucking champagne bottle, Coldwater?”

The laugh that bursts out of Quentin, happy, easy, a little choked up, doesn’t surprise him, and Margo smirks. She cradles it to her chest though and sits down, eyes sparkling with mirth. 

Quentin sucks in a breath, the music still playing, and his voice wavers as he starts another verse.

The flames welcome his hands warmly, curling against his fingers as he pulls the next item from the ashes inside.

Quentin brushes his fingers against the Brakebills logo on the mug. The mug he mended in Brakebills South after Mayakovsky told him his discipline when he’d returned to his reality, to Alice of all people, who’d sat with him when he fixed the shards and put them back together. 

Alice sits a little straighter when he turns around, holding the cup in his hands, her eyes traveling down to look at it.

* * *

_despite all of my ranting and raging so_

* * *

“How does it feel?” Alice asks, gentle, as the cracks in the mug seal and it slowly settles on the table.

The answer comes easy to Quentin, a realization that has snuck up on him quickly and quietly, and he wonders if Alice was right saying that, maybe, he’s known all along, deep down. “Like I helped it wake up and…remember what it was before.”

He looks up to find Alice gazing at him, and it feels…not uncomfortable. There’s something in her eyes, something that Quentin isn’t sure he wants to parse out in detail. His eyes travel back to look at the mug he mended. It sits there, whole again, as if it was never broken to begin with, and isn’t that the most ironic thing? That his discipline is the repair of small objects when he can’t even put himself back together.

“That’s not true,” Alice answers before Quentin realizes that he uttered his thoughts out loud. She’s looking at him again, a mixture of sadness and soft pride in her eyes, and Quentin is surprised by how unbothered is by that, by _her_. “You’ve been putting yourself together over and over again, Quentin. You have picked yourself up time and again, and you always came out the other end whole. If anything it’s kind of a given that fixing things would be your discipline.”

It squeezes the air out of his lungs. “I don’t feel whole.”

A sad look crosses Alice’s face. “That’s because you don’t allow yourself to,” she points out. “You always think something is either wrong or missing when it’s not.”

Quentin studies her face, and she holds his gaze, lifting her chin a little. He wonders how they lost each other along the way and why they couldn’t find one another again.

“There is,” he simply replies then. He can’t tell if he’s being stubborn or if he truly believes what he says.

“Just because you can’t always make all your pieces fit back together the way they were before doesn’t mean that anything is missing,” Alice says after a pause, voice so soft it almost gets lost in the space between them. “You change and your circumstances do, too. With that, you adjust all the pieces. You’re not the same person you were when we first met.”

It’s not an accusation, far from it, and Quentin is surprised at himself that her saying that doesn’t raise his hackles. He’s been pushing her away ever since she appeared on his doorstep again, hostile and exhausted and ungrateful. Not without reason, yes, but most of what he’s said and done was unnecessarily cruel when he knew—has always known—that Alice’s motivation has always stemmed from the desire to help, even if it was misguided at times. She’s had her own issues and struggles, trying to make sense of magic just as much as he had; trying to figure out where in this world she fit. 

Later, when they’re in the Drowned Garden, and Quentin feels like he’s going to vibrate out of his skin in frustration, Alice is there to keep him from shattering into a million pieces. 

“Being an adult doesn’t mean that you have to let go of the things you love,” she tells him, grasping his arm and squeezing gently. It’s a grounding comfort that he finds himself leaning into. 

“Then what does it mean?” Quentin asks, frustrated and helpless. 

Alice looks at him. “Seeing the world through new eyes,” she offers with a sad smile. “It means that you take all your pieces and rearrange them in a way that makes you see the world again clearly. It means…helping yourself wake up and feel whole again even if things are different. Especially when things are different. You’re still you; you’re still whole.” 

She squeezes his arm one more time before she leaves him, taking 23 with her. 

Quentin is still whole. Cracked, bruised, battered, badly, yes. But whole.

* * *

_**or worse there's too many** _

* * *

Alice’s eyes shine wetly in the light of the fire. She swallows, mouth turned down at the corners as she tries not to let the tears spill over. The realization that he still wants her in his life hit him harder than he could ever have anticipated a couple of days ago. It didn’t wipe away all the shit that happened but she had smiled at him and they agreed to give each other the time and opportunity to grow and find their footing again. 

She’d clung to him, hard and desperate when he reached for her hand running from the disintegrating sparks the magic of his spell had created in the mirror realm. Her fists had connected painfully with his shoulders as she drummed against him, face tear-streaked and twisted in hopeless desperation. Quentin had held her tight against his chest and whispered, “I’m here,” over and over again until she calmed down. 

Quentin holds out the mug to her. Gingerly, Alice cups her hands around it and pulls it against her chest. 

“I woke up,” he finds himself saying, his voice sounding choked up even to his own ears. “And I—I start to remember who I was—who I am.”

Alice sniffles quietly, a small smile settling on her lips. “Yeah,” she responds. “Me, too.”

She reaches out for his hand and he offers up his own in turn. 

Music continues to curl around them, and Quentin finds it increasingly difficult to sing, to get the words out now when he’s overwhelmed with the waves of emotion crashing over his head for his friends. And he’s not even done yet.

He meets Julia’s eyes for a second before he returns to the fire to pull her item out of the flames. It’s a map of Fillory, a paper duplicate of the one on the bottom side of her table. The memory of going to Fillory with Julia for the first time hits him like a ton of bricks, and as excited and full of dread as he’d been at the prospect of going to Fillory at all—he’s glad it was Julia with whom he made that very first trip.

Quentin steps up to her, showing her the map, and a delighted burst of laughter falls from Jules’ lips. Her eyes are filled with tears, shining in the light of the flames, as she covers her mouth with a hand and looks over the map, tracing it with the fingers of the other.

* * *

_here's to the ones who hide the bullet from the gun_

* * *

Quentin feels numb. It has been building, this feeling of utter and entire hopeless helplessness, of feeling like a complete failure and the bone-deep desire to just…give up, give in to the despair, give himself over to the lurking blackness that’s almost front and center in his mind now, beckoning him playfully, whispering sweet, sweet promises that make his resolve, hope and fight brittle until all it takes for them to crumble is the flap of a butterfly. 

He wants to sleep, desperately. He wants to sleep, wants to slip into one of the dreams in which he sees Eliot, wonderful, kind Eliot who looks at Quentin like he’s the most precious thing he’s ever laid his eyes on. Eliot who doesn’t love him like Quentin loves him but that—Quentin doesn’t need that now. All he needs is to have Eliot back. 

He needs all of this to be _over_.

Jules comes over, cradling a glass of something. His own he keeps swirling in his hand, the attempt of numbing the numbness less compelling than he thought it would be. The alcohol burns in his throat, leaving a warm trail down to his stomach but it’s no help, no distraction. She looks him over.

“Hey,” she greets, tries for a smile but misses by a mile. “This isn’t over.”

“Yes, it is.” Quentin doesn’t feel like fighting over this because there isn’t any fight left in him anymore. The Monster got the last piece to resurrect his sister, and the only thing that could save them—but probably not _Eliot_ —is a goddamn fucking miracle. Quentin doesn’t need saving. He needs to save Eliot, he needed to save Eliot, and even that is impossible now. 

_Eliot. Eliot. Eliot_.

“The Monster has all the pieces he needs. If he gets his sister back, there’s no way we can stop them from whatever it is they’re gonna do. Fuck, we couldn’t do anything to stop the Monster from doing anything he wanted. And I—how am I supposed to save Eliot now?”

 _Eliot. Eliot. Eliot_.

Jules leans against the banister, looking him over with concern written in big bold letters on her face. “Q,” she finally says, quiet, quiet. “I know you want to save Eliot.”

 _Eliot. Eliot. Eliot_.

“I _need_ to save Eliot,” Quentin corrects with a snort, exhausted, exhausted, so _fucking_ exhausted, hopeless.

 _Eliot. Eliot. Eliot_.

Julia spins the glass between her hands. “Why?”

 _Eliot. Eliot. Eliot_.

Quentin purses his lips. “Because I do.”

Jules keeps her eyes on him, silence settling between them as she studies him with careful scrutiny. He’s never been able to hide what he’s feeling from her; fuck, he’s never been able to hide his feelings _period_. Eliot knew, not only because Quentin told him, asked him, but because he’d been unable to keep his emotions out of the way even after Eliot rejected him.

“Does he know?” Julia asks, her voice barely above a whisper. “Does he know that you love him so much you’d gladly kill yourself to bring him back?”

Quentin can’t bring himself to look at her. He feels oddly violated that she sees this particular brand of his— _whatever_ , and at the same time he’s relieved that she said what he’s been thinking all along, unable and unwilling to share these thoughts with anyone voluntarily.

“I’d do it for anyone,” he tries.

“Stop,” Julia says, sharp but still quiet. “We both know you wouldn’t. You wouldn’t actively run towards death and self-harm, not the way you’ve been doing these past few weeks.”

Quentin feels his jaw clench in response, takes a sip from his glass to release some of the tension. 

“Q, it’s not gonna help anyone if you—if you—” She sucks in a breath, and starts a third time, “If you decide to disregard your own life and safety, and get hurt in the process. It won’t do you any good, and certainly not Eliot.”

“Eliot’s gone.” Quentin forces the words out of his mouth, and they burn, _burn_ as if he had poured a bottle of drain cleaner down his throat. The blackness in his mind smiles invitingly.

Julia remains silent for a minute. Then, “Do you want to take that back?”

Quentin screws his eyes shut, forcing in a breath. “Yes.”

Jules is nodding when he opens his eyes again. She offers him a tiny smile but it doesn’t reach him; the numbness eviscerates any of its effect mid-air, tearing through it like it’s an attack coming.

“It’s not over, Q,” she reminds him again, putting a hand on his knee, and Quentin can feel that, only barely. Julia steps closer, slides a hand into his hair, gently, gently. “We can still do this. We _will_ do this. You need to be here when he comes back. I know you’d hate yourself even more if you weren’t.”

“Then why does it feel like it’s over?” Quentin asks her, blinking his eyes up at her. Exhausted. Devastated. Hollow.

Julia rubs at his temple with gentle fingers. “Because that monster in your head has grown again.” She says it with a sad smile and an agonized look in her eyes. “And you’re stretched so thin. Don’t give in. Fight.”

The air rattles in his lungs on an inhale. “I can’t,” Quentin admits, defeated. 

Jules presses her palm to the side of his face, and Quentin doesn’t need to look at her to know what expression is spread on her face. He’s been the recipient of it often enough that by now it feels more like a self-inflicted punishment. (It’s not Julia’s fault. She worries, she’s scared for him, and it’s terrifying. _He_ did that.)

“Q,” she whispers, crouches down, folding her arms across his knees. “You kept all of us going. When we wanted to just kill him, you pushed for us to find a way to save Eliot. You kept the Monster from killing Eliot. It’s not over. Eliot is fighting from within, Q, and we’ll keep fighting from without. He’s in there working to get back out to you. Remember that, too.”

He shudders through an exhale.

“Remember something true about him,” Julia says. She staring at him intently as if she’s willing him to do what she tells him. “A memory to hold onto.”

The blackness in his mind curls around him, hissing when he tries to pull up anything, anything happy, anything good, anything true but Quentin has a hard time remembering anyway. It takes him a second, and then it hits him so hard he grips Julia’s arms, digging his fingers into them.

“Tell me,” Julia prods softly.

The first time he felt anything resembling hope, a rush of something strong enough to penetrate the numbness.

“In the park,” Quentin answers, breathless. “He broke through, for a moment, Eliot was back. He’s _alive_.”

The way Eliot had looked at him, it never leaves him: so full of hope—hope, there it is, again and again—pain, longing, wound up tight, with a tiny spark of happiness, so dwindling it was barely there. Quentin caught it. 

“Hold on to that,” Julia instructs, rubs her palms along his thighs. “Hold on to him. He’s not gone. You’re not alone.”

Quentin squeezes his eyes shut again, sees Eliot smiling at him— _Q. Q, it’s me. It’s Eliot_ —and it gives him a little bit ground to stand on, a little stability, a sliver of hope.

Julia takes his hand, and Quentin twines their fingers together. Eliot is a memory, an image that tethers him in his mind. Jules is real, tangible, and anchors him out here. The weight of her, her solidity, her softness, they pull him down from where he’s feeling like he’s floating above his own head looking down, and center him in his own body, and he slowly starts to sense like he belongs again.

“I’ll give you anything I can, Q.”

Quentin knows.

* * *

_**I hope I'm not a regret** _

* * *

Jules takes the map from his hands. They both know it inside out but she still runs her fingers over it as if it’s brand new. She gets up and throws her hands around his neck, pushing close. Quentin winds his arms around her shoulders as he buries his nose against her neck.

“Thank you,” he murmurs as he pulls her impossibly closer. “For giving me back hope.”

He can hear a quiet sob, feels her nodding. “Thank you,” she echoes between sniffles. “For never giving up.”

They don’t need many words between them, never had. It makes it that much harder to let go of her, though, because everything is in that hug, making Quentin feel like he’s safe from his own head if he only never untangles himself from her. 

He takes a step back as Julia sits down, carefully rolling the map. Quentin takes a deep breath, straightens his shoulders.

There’s a swooping in his gut as his eyes land on Eliot. Eliot who is staring right back at him, eyes dark and unfathomable as he locks their gazes together. Quentin’s heart tumbles and trips, and there is so much he wants to tell him, not all of it anything Eliot even wants to hear. It’s okay. It really is. He’s back and that’s all Quentin ever wanted. Everything else doesn’t matter. Everything else are Quentin’s own issues.

Eliot is back. Eliot is alive. The Monster is gone. That’s all Quentin’s been fighting for. 

Quentin turns back to the fire, shivers like sparks skipping down his vertebrae as he feels Eliot’s eyes on him as if were his hands. It’s almost too much, and not enough and—

There’s no surprise, really, when he pulls the peach out of the ashes. It’s round and plump, a soft pale colour with a fuzz that tickles Quentin’s palm, emanating a sweet scent that wraps Quentin up in his memories; memories that aren’t pictures or images but sensations, emotions, the swooping in his stomach he’d get whenever the light would catch in Eliot’s hair and he smiled at Quentin, wide and beautiful, without holding back. 

Maybe this is unfair. Maybe it’s unfair giving Eliot a peach. Maybe Eliot wouldn’t mind, not when it doesn’t hold the same meaning for him as it does for Quentin. Maybe Quentin is being unfair to himself by giving Eliot a peach when it means something different to him than it does to Eliot. 

Quentin means love.

Eliot—for Eliot, it’s a memory of a lived-unlived life. 

Quentin stares at the piece of fruit in his hand. Does it matter what it means to either of them?

He wanted to save Eliot, simple and clean. It didn’t come with conditions. 

Behind him, Eliot hedges, “Q.” 

It’s a soft sound, gentle and welcoming, like a warm hand at his nape or a brush of thumbs over his cheekbones. 

He wanted to save Eliot because he loves him. Truth. He wanted to save Eliot regardless of whether or not Eliot reciprocated in the same way. Truth. He wanted to save Eliot because he loves Eliot, and he’ll continue to love Eliot in any way he will allow him to do that.

Truth.

* * *

_foot down on all my bullshit but won't cage me in_

* * *

Quentin has a hard time focusing on the tut when Eliot is lying on the forest floor, bleeding, and Margo’s desperate voice fills his ears. It takes all of his will power, all the pent up despair at getting the Monster out of Eliot’s body, every last shred of fight he can scrape together from where it lies shattered and scattered at the outer edges of his mind, to see it through and complete the Incorporate Bond. 

As soon as it’s done, he scrambles over to where Margo is kneeling over Eliot, whose eyes are open now. Margo’s hands cover his abdomen, and oh Gods, there is so much blood. So much blood. Too much blood.

“We need to get him to Lipson,” Quentin hears himself say, sounding far away and strained to his own ears. He wraps his arm around Eliot’s shoulder and hoists him up as his other hand slips to his stomach. His fingers slide over the drenched fabric of the shirt, the blood warm and wet against his skin, and too much, too much, too much.

More of it starts dripping from the corner of Eliot’s mouth as he offers Quentin a weak, barely-there smile, leaning heavily against him. Quentin’s knees almost buckle. 

“Stay with me,” Quentin croaks, digging his fingers into Eliot’s shoulder, holding tight, desperate, helpless, again or still, he can’t even tell. 

The world falls away around him. Indistinctly, he hears Alice saying something, Margo’s hand on his where he’s pressing it against Eliot’s wound; something warm and wet soaks into his own shirt, but Quentin can only look at Eliot’s face. 

Eliot’s eyes are still open, fixed on Quentin. He looks like it takes every last shred of strength to keep them open and then he’s coughing up even more blood, _Jesus_. 

“Q,” Eliot manages, voice petering off, barely audible to begin with. “Q, I—”

“I’m here,” Quentin says. He reaches up, brushes strands of hair out of Eliot’s face, leaving streaks of blood at his temples. “We’re here. You’re gonna be okay—you—it’s okay, we got you. You have to be okay.”

Eliot loses consciousness before he can respond, just as 23 travels them straight into the Brakebills infirmary. Margo is yelling and then someone is prying Eliot out of his arms. Quentin instinctively holds on tighter, turning to push himself between whoever wants to take him away but then Alice is at his arm, pulling gently.

“Q,” she says, voice echoing oddly, far away, and the world around him is blurry. “Q, you need to let go. They need to take care of him.”

Several other healers swarm them, putting Eliot on a gurney, assessing, touching, hands flying, doing something. 

“Q, we need to get the bottles to the Seam,” Alice says, jostling him a little to get his attention. 

The thrum of his too-quick pulse echoes loudly in Quentin’s ears. 

Lipson’s—where did she come from?—saying, “They need all the ambient for those bottles.”

Quentin’s entire world tips, the ground beneath his feet falling away. Margo’s voice cuts through the haze, urgent, desperate, angry.

“What’s the point of being a magician if you can’t use it?”

Lipson starts moving the gurney with Eliot on it down the hallway, her eyes focused on him while Margo trails her like a shadow.

“Before I was a magician I was a trauma surgeon. I’m perfectly capable of saving him the old-fashioned way,” Lipson counters, enough snide in her voice to shut Margo up. “If you need to cry, go outside.”

“Q,” Alice says again.

Margo turns around to look at him. Her bottom lip is trembling, eyes wide and full of helpless devastation. She sniffles, straightens and walks over to them, putting a hand on Quentin’s shoulder.

“Go,” she orders with regal confidence. “We can’t do anything for him right now but you can get rid of that the Monster. You can do _that_ for him.”

Margo cups his chin in one of her hands, making him look at her. “Come back when you’re done. Come back to be here when he wakes up.”

Quentin inhales, jaw clenching, and nods. Margo mirrors it, fixes him with another intent look before leaning in to press a kiss to his cheek. 

Margo lets go of him and Alice slides her hand into his, holding on as 23 travels them in front of the mirror in one of the Brakebills classrooms. 

When Quentin holds the remaining bottle in his hand in front of the Seam with Everett—is that his name?—reaching for it, the blackness in his mind croons at him with a toothy smile. Something in this dead, dark place appeals to him, to a part of him that unfurls as it steps up to the ledge, reading to fall. It’s overpowering.

Quentin looks past Everett’s shoulder at 23 as his resolve hards, and the blackness inside spreads its talons with a gleeful little chuckle. 

“Take her,” Quentin says. “Do it.”

23 wraps his arms around Alice before he’s done speaking, and Quentin casts the spell. Magic skitters over his skin, cold, clinical, destructive, and the mirror mends, so easily. Everett stumbles towards him as Quentin tosses the bottle into the Seam, sparks catching and bouncing and flaring; magic flying through the room in a pretty shower of fireworks.

In this dark, dead place it’s easy to look the blackness in his mind in the eye and let go of all the things that have weighed him down.

Quentin feels it snarling at him and snapping at his heels as he turns to Alice. He catches her outstretched hand, solid and warm and anchoring. 

_Peaches and plums, motherfucker._

Everett disintegrates, caught in the shower of beautiful lights. He’s there one moment, and gone the next. Vanished. Ceased to exist. Just like that.

_I’m alive in here._

Quentin grips Alice’s hand, feels her nails digging into his skin in turn.

_You are not alone here._

Margo is waiting for him to return. He needs to make sure Julia is okay. Eliot…the urge the see Eliot wake up propels him forward. Eliot will need support to heal, and Quentin wants to be there for that; wants to help him and comfort him and make sure he knows he’s safe, secure… _loved_ , in any way he needs. 

_Eliot. Eliot. Eliot._

Eliot’s surgery went, comparatively, as Lipson pointed out, smoothly. He’d lost a lot of blood but they had enough blood bags for transfusion ready, and the wound, though deep, didn’t require a lot of extra work to fix. Luckily, Margo hadn’t hit any major organs that would’ve complicated the operation or recovery.

Margo sits curled up in one of the uncomfortable chairs next to Eliot’s bed. She dropped like someone had cut her strings, all the stress and adrenaline leaving her at once, and she’s been asleep shortly after, holding Eliot’s hand in hers.

And Quentin. He sits on the other side of the bed, chair pulled up close to the bed, and ghosts his fingers around Eliot’s hand. Quentin doesn’t have the energy left in him to describe how he feels. Now that the tightly wrought anxiety that had spun around him after his and Brian’s memories mixed has left him, the only thing left is a bone-deep, heavy weight of exhaustion, and a burnt out shell that only moves and speaks and feels from memory alone. 

But then Eliot stirs, slow and sluggish. He blinks his eyes open, and Quentin is on him in an instant, stroking a stray strand of hair from his forehead. Eliot’s still pale and sickly-looking, drained from the surgery and months of his body being mistreated in a number of different ways. His lips curl at the corners, though, as he sees Quentin, eyes slipping shut again.

“Q,” he murmurs, barely there: a sound so soft and sweet, Quentin’s heart seizes. “Q.”

“I’m here,” Quentin promises, hands fluttering helplessly over Eliot’s face and shoulders, and his voice cracks. “I’m here, El. I’m _here_.”

Eliot blinks slowly at him, eyes never opening fully, unconsciousness pulling him back down under. He smiles still, fingers finding Quentin’s, as his eyes fall shut. Eliot takes a breath, “Q—,” as if to say something more, but then his voice peters out, and he’s sleeping again. 

Quentin strokes a gentle hand over his hair, pushing the urge to curl up next to him on the bed down, deep, deep, deep. 

Quentin loves him, and Eliot loves him back. Truth. Quentin loves him, honest and abundant, and Eliot doesn’t. Truth.

Eliot’s _back_ , and Quentin is _here_. Truth.

It’s more than he thought he’d have a couple of days ago. 

* * *

_**some reasons not to die and there you are** _

* * *

Quentin rolls the peach from hand to hand as he faces Eliot. His heart keeps skipping beats with the way Eliot looks at him, and yeah, it’s still too much and not enough at the same time. The music still flows, the words weaving through his head, but he can’t make himself sing.

“You came back—” _To me_ , he wants to say, but swallows the words before they can be ripped from his throat. “And I—I don’t know what I would’ve done if you hadn’t, so. Um. Thank you for—fighting. For—not giving up. I guess.”

He offers Eliot the peach, and Eliot takes it carefully. There’s a pause, a heavy silence between them as Eliot closes his palm around the fruit, bringing it up against his lips. His eyes slip shut as he takes a breath, inhaling the hauntingly familiar sweet scent of it. 

When his eyes flick back up to meet Quentin’s, they shine with unshed tears. It takes everything Quentin has, all the last scraps, not to wrap himself around Eliot, kissing his cheeks, his temples, his nose, his forehead, his lips. 

_Truth: I’ll love you in any way you let me._

_Truth: I love you in every way I know how._

_Truth: Loving you is one of the realest things I have ever felt._

Eliot clears his throat and nods. “Thank you—” He trips and stumbles, halts, looking up at Quentin with the peach in his hand, thumb rubbing back and forth over the fuzzy surface. No words following, and Eliot swallows, as if there’s either too much he wants to say, or not enough. Quentin can empathize. 

Eliot reaches out with his other hand, and Quentin is helpless to do anything but grab it with his own; lets himself be guided closer until Eliot can wrap an arm around his middle and rest his ear against his ribcage. Quentin’s heart twists in on itself.

The music still plays, sweetly wafting over them, and Quentin takes a breath. 

If there are reasons not to die, these people, his friends, his family, are as good as they get. 

He looks at them, at Julia, at Alice and Margo, down at Eliot who’s still holding him. They’re the reason he’s _here_. Each of them, a light in the dark, in their own way an anchor to his fickle mind; all of them a point of grounding him to the here and now, enveloping him in support, encouragement and hope. Who offer up parts of themselves to him in order to prove that he’s not alone, never alone. 

Margo pulls him down between her and Eliot so they’re all sitting squeezed tightly together. Quentin rests his head on Margo’s shoulder as Eliot nuzzles against his neck, and Alice winds an arm around Margo’s back to rest her hand against his back. Julia reaches across to grab for his hand.

They sit huddled together with the last of the piano and the words in their heads petering out softly. Quentin’s heartbeat settles, for the first time in days, into a somewhat steady rhythm; the anxiety in his veins ebbs as their warmth soaks into him, all the points of contact rejuvenating something small and lost inside him. 

He’s _here_. He’s here, surrounded by everyone he loves, and it’s like he’s finally, finally _arrived_. 

* * *

_**here's to my friends** _

**_all in until the bitter end_ **

* * *

*

*

*

*

*

*

*

Quentin slowly untangles from everyone, appreciates the little touches and lingering grazes against his arms and shoulders as they get up, sending gentle smiles his way that curl protectively around him. He catches Margo’s hand sliding over Eliot’s shoulder as she walks past him, staying connected until she’s too far away to reach him any longer. Julia and Alice catch up to her, and they hook their arms together as they make their way back to the cottage. 

Eliot remains seated next to him, posture straight and impeccable, regal and beautiful. In the warm light of the fire casting dancing shadows and a soft glow across his features, he looks ethereal. Like something Quentin dreamed up, even though Quentin’s sure he could never in his wildest dream imagine someone as wonderful as Eliot Waugh. 

The bonfire tints Eliot’s eyes gold, and Quentin feels their warmth skid across his face as Eliot gazes at him, expression one full of wonder.

“I feel like I should be the one giving you the peach,” Eliot confesses without taking his eyes off Quentin. There’s a small, self-deprecating smile on his lips. 

Quentin doesn’t like that smile. He frowns at Eliot and reaches out on instinct, touching his fingers to the heel of his hand. “Why?”

Eliot casts his eyes down to their hands. He raises his own a little and hooks his hand around Quentin’s until he can slide his fingers in his palm, twining their them together. Quentin follows the motion, his own fingers linking with Eliot’s on their own accord, and there’s barely anything else that has felt as natural as this.

Eliot’s thumb sweeps over his skin. Slowly, he lifts his gaze to look at Quentin. There’s a determined set to his mouth, but a devastating softness in his eyes. 

Eliot inhales a deep breath and holds it for a second before releasing it again. His fingers squeeze Quentin’s gently. 

“I love you.”

Eliot says it with a grace that leaves Quentin breathless. Simple and honest, three little words, and Quentin’s entire world careens off its fucking tracks in a way that is so entirely new he’s not in the least bit prepared on how to handle _that_. 

“What?” It stumbles out of his mouth on its own accord.

Eliot sends him another one of those self-deprecating smiles, but it’s softer now, less sharp around the edges; almost like he’s expected this reaction—which doesn’t make it any better. He adjusts his position a little by turning more towards Quentin, careful not to disrupt their hands, his golden eyes enveloping Quentin, drawing him in, and it’s—it’s _unfair_ and intoxicating and _Quentin never wants it to stop_.

“I love you, Q,” Eliot repeats, and it sounds so familiar to what he’d said on the steps in the throne room. _I love you, Q,_ but… Quentin is torn between wanting to lean in closer and shrink away, drink in more of whatever Eliot decides to give him and escape the icy feeling of rejection. 

Eliot must see his inner turmoil—Jesus, has he ever; Quentin is broadcasting on a normal day, and Eliot reads him like a book he actually _enjoys_ reading, effortlessly taking in all the details—because his free hand comes up to settle at the side of his neck, sweet and gentle and so reassuring Quentin feels himself go boneless. 

“I love you, and I need you to hear this, I love you in a way that utterly terrifies me. Because what I feel for you, it’s—more real than anything I have felt before. At least in terms of, well. _Love_ love,” Eliot continues, says that last part with a pained expression and an eye roll as if he can’t believe he’s using high school lingo. “It scared the fuck out of me when you asked—because I realized that that was it. Because I knew then, I know now that you are true and good and—and you _loved_ me—”

“Love,” Quentin corrects on autopilot, and is met by the most blinding and radiant of all smiles that have ever been directed at him. He blinks, starstruck.

“I was afraid, Q. I was so afraid of you, of what you—of what you were _offering_ , just…leaving for me to take, and I—I did the only thing I knew I could, the only thing I knew would mean I wouldn’t, I don’t know, fuck us up on a profound level, I guess? So I—ran.” 

“You didn’t run in Fillory,” Quentin points out quietly. He doesn’t know why he says it, maybe just to be a shit.

The cracked open expression in Eliot’s eyes is too much to bear but Quentin holds his gaze. Eliot carefully crafts himself every day anew, tucking away all the rough edges, the vulnerable scraps, the raw endings, always cloaks himself in an aura of indifference and hedonism, so this—this rare, pure, glowing moment of utter unencumbered vulnerability he willingly shares with Quentin, armor discarded and defenses completely lowered—

It _matters_. More than anything else. It’s Eliot deciding to lay himself bare at Quentin’s feet, trusting him to be gentle with his very core.

“I did, though,” Eliot admits. “You met Arielle, and I ran.”

“But you stopped.”

“Yeah.” Eliot agrees easily, another small, intimate smile on his lips as he watches Quentin’s face. “I did. You needed me and—I loved you back then, too. And it was Fillory. It was a different time, a different place, a different _life_ , and—I guess you just bring it out in me.”

Quentin feels his eyebrows do a thing, and Eliot reaches up, smoothing out the crease with the tips of his fingers.

“I was stuck in a mind palace when—you know when. So when I saw you, remember?—”

“Yes.”

“I had to face my most traumatic, most repressed memory for regaining control, and well, that was when you asked me and I ran,” Eliot tells him. It does something complicated to Quentin’s insides, a tug and a rush, and so many things at once. “And when I did, I promised you, my good, true, brave Q, that I’d be braver once I got out because of you, because you taught me to be, and so—here I am.”

 _My_ Q. Quentin’s heart stutters excitedly. 

“This is me,” Eliot says, straightening a little, presenting himself. “I love you. I’m fucking terrified and I’ll probably fuck up more than once, but this is me, off my bullshit, telling you that—that I want to do this again with you. That I’m—I’m ready to let you choose me and to choose you, too, and to— _fuck_ —to try and be the best version of me. For you.”

Quentin lurches forward and kisses Eliot. It’s sloppy and uncoordinated and less than graceful, but Eliot’s hands come up to frame his jaw gently, guiding Quentin until they align perfectly for a kiss that is so sweet and thorough that it has him melting into Eliot, pliant and warm. 

When they break apart, Quentin takes a moment to catch his breath. “I don’t need you to be the best version of yourself,” he says then, sliding a hand from Eliot’s wrist down to his elbow. “I just need you to be honest with me—and—and when it gets—when your mind goes dark, to tell me. So we can work this out together. Don’t—please, don’t just, uh, run away when you get scared.”

Eliot leans in, drops as kiss on his lips, and proceeds to pull him into a hug. He buries his nose in the crook of Quentin’s neck.

“I promise I’ll try,” he mutters.

Quentin wraps his arms around Eliot and hooks his chin over his shoulder. It’s a start. This shit doesn’t come easy to either of them, and Eliot, for all his grandeur, is just as much in his head as Quentin, prone to believing the voices that tell him it’s all not worth shit.

“I’m glad you’re here,” Eliot murmurs softly against his ear. Quentin nuzzles into him, breathes him in, rubs his hands over Eliot’s back, happy warmth spreading through him.

“Me, too.”

_Truth._

**Author's Note:**

> If you feel like it, you can come say hi on either [twitter](https://twitter.com/proofsofconcept) or [tumblr](https://coldwaughtered.tumblr.com/).


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